byRouzell First published onApril 8, 2012
(Originally, with no image… Note: I’ve been blogging about blogging for a very long time!)

A Blogging Primer for Adults

Here we will begin to explore the value of blogging for people with a lot of history to share. The purpose here is encourage our elders to “put down in words” the experience they have to share with the world. If we fail in doing so, I fear we will lose an opportunity to learn so many lessons from our greatest natural resource – people who have something interesting to share!

Just so we don’t close without a few words to illustrate these lessons, we offer this:

Blogging is a term you can look up using Google or Wikipedia, but here is what you will find: A blog is short for weblog – meaning a place on the web for writing your journal entries. Think of it as a kind of electronic memoir site, where you can write anything you are thinking about that day, or memories from a time long ago; anything you think might be interesting to your readers. The key is to have fun and use your collection of experiences to tell stories and entertain yourself and others.

Search “blog” and Wikipedia will tell you it is a portmanteau – woo hoo! Search “blog” on Google and you’ll find (at least) dozens of sites that are hoping to be the host site for your memoirs.

Come back here for more advice on how to get started. We’ll steer you straight and give you the honest truth about how to get started the right way. In our next post, we’ll discuss some of the websites you can use to get started for free. And, we’ll talk about how you make a good choice, based on your needs.

Mousehelp at Rouzell may soon become Mousehelp Communications

Why the change? It’s a simple and very complex answer. Let’s just say that Mousehelp does so much more than computer support. Communications is so much more.

Searching for the expression about a shoemaker’s children, I found details on several sources. Since I suffer this malady (or some of my websites do), I thought to mention it and perhaps ask other website makers how they manage to maintain their own sites while working on client sites.

As goes the expression, my websites need “new shoes.” This one (Rouzell.net) should be my first target, but it may be relegated to the archives soon. Most likely, Rouzell will fade away and simply be replaced by Mousehelp.

Having run rouzell.net through a speed test, I’ve found it scores well below the majority of sites and one speed test ranks it with a solid “D” for Performance grade. Sheesh!

Assuming you are already on Nextdoor and you have connected with your neighborhood, what can you now do to attract clients or customers to your business? As is so often the case, the answer is, “it depends.”

If you need assistance with creating your account and claiming your page on Nextdoor, one call or message to Mousehelp.com will get you the help you need. Brian Rouley at Mousehelp will provide “Compassionate Care for People with Computers” – anything you need from network connections, to printer installations, to how-to instruction, and even writing for your blog or website. Mousehelp.com is your electronic communications support expert. In a world full of noise, get the clarity you need, with Mousehelp Communications Training from mousehelp.com.

It seems if you’ve been recommended, you are more likely to be found when people search Nextdoor. The process of claiming your page allows you to enhance the information people get about you and your business on the Nextdoor website.

If you had to demonstrate how a slideshow looks on a smartphone to someone who does not have a smartphone, how would you do it?
I’m sure I have another way to do this, but this is what came to mind first, so, here it is!

Here we will discuss the value and benefit of each to your business. At first blush, I’m guessing that Nextdoor will benefit service providers focused on homeowners and Alignable will be better for businesses who provide B2B services. I’ll be making a list and checking it twice, guessing that both networks turn out to be nice!

That may sound funny, but sometimes you have to say it that way. If you just say networking, it could mean at least a few other things to technical people, or social media enthusiasts, or to people who don’t meet new people face-to-face. English has so many ambiguities!

What I’m talking about, more specifically, is the networking you do where you show up to meetings that are prearranged and attended by basically the same group of people every time. For me, this is a combination of groups. Sunrise Marketing on Tuesday, Desert Networking Professionals on Wednesday, Toastmasters Thursday, and I’m invited to another networking group on Friday mornings. These are all morning meetings. And, that’s a lot of time to commit to being with people on a regular basis. Taken in total, it has the potential to consume around six to ten hours per week of what might otherwise be productive time.

While I could go on about the number of clients, and the new business I’ve been able to find through this method, I would rather focus on the wonderful personal and professional connections I’ve made. In the end, one drives the other. People who know me, like me, trust me – those who have met me via the “networking with people” approach, are far more likely to send referrals and people they know to me for the services I provide.